May 2012
25 posts
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April 2012
29 posts
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“Most grad schools look for people who have worked for a couple years after...”
– Nikki Sylianteng on reflecting on the work you do and defining its value
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“You cannot be a cynic or a skeptic when you build a building. You cannot be a...”
– Daniel Libeskind, from Hillman Curtis’s Artist Series
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Reflections on Reviewing Portfolios, or, some...
I was honored to be asked by Northampton Community College, a school where I spent a year and half, to come back and critique portfolios of the current graduates. I remember what it was like to be on the other side of that table showing my own book, thinking how much I thought I knew while also finding the feedback and response to my work incredibly helpful.
I’m not sure I was as helpful...
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“Being a geek is all about your own personal level of enthusiasm, not how your...”
– —Mary Sue, What It Means to be A Geek
Oh man. Wow. I was smiling so much reading this. I feel like it explains why my eyes light up every time I hear someone say Helvetica, or I smile to myself when I hear the name Woody Allen, or I turn to look who just brought up Steve Jobs. Being a geek is...
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How to Build an Owl
by Kathleen Lynch
Decide you must.
Develop deep respect for feather, bone, claw.
Place your trembling thumb where the heart will be: for one hundred hours watch so you will know where to put the first feather.
Stay awake forever. When the bird takes shape gently pry open its beak and whisper into it: mouse.
Let it go.
(via jackcheng)
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“I want everything we do to be beautiful. I don’t give a damn whether the client...”
– Saul Bass, who died 16 years ago today.
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“A writer should concern himself with whatever absorbs his fancy, stirs his...”
– E.B. White, from this fantastic 1969 interview in The Paris Review
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“The isms go; the ist dies; art remains.”
– Vladimir Nabokov in his lecture on Gustave Flaubert, asserting the historic relativity and therefore the artistic irrelevance of academic terms like “realism” or “post-modernist.” (via mills)
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Kids - MGMT
It’s starting to feel like...
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Bierut on Rand on Logos →
Felt and Wire has an excellent interview with Michael Bierut on the new logo he designed for Mohawk paper. I love the way Bierut thinks about design and the purposeful approach he takes to his work. I nearly jumped out of my chair in excitement reading his thoughts on Paul Rand’s approach to logo design:
Paul Rand has written quite eloquently about how logos really are vessels for...
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Robert Caro's Big Dig →
The New York Times Magazine has an excellent profile on Robert Caro, a 76 year old writer who’s been writing a biography of Lyndon Baines Johnson for almost 40 years and just released the fourth book in what was originally supposed to be a three-book series (and Johnson has only now president).
At this rate, it’s taking Caro longer to write the books than it took Johnson to actually...
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It’s So Easy - Buddy Holly
There is...
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How Rem Koolhaas Works →
I completely devoured this 2005 New Yorker profile of architect Rem Koolhaas this morning. I was somewhat familiar with his work but didn’t know anything about this process, operation style, and thinking. I just wanted to pull out a few quotes from the piece I really enjoyed.
On how Koolhaas’s studio, OMA, operates:
“People think that Rem creates everything, but he doesn’t. He...
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“To create anything… is to believe, if only momentarily, you are capable of...”
– Tom Bissell explores the secrets of creators and creation. (via explore-blog)
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On Late Style →
Peter Mendelsund questions whether design has a “late style”, whether older designers can and do produce their best work in the later years of their life (like Matisse’s cut paper, Shakespeare’s The Winter Tale, or Beethoven’s opus 132):
There are many older designers in the public eye. There are many experienced designers garnering their fair share of attention...
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“An artist’s job is to sit outside what’s happening and reflect back to us where...”
– Douglas Rushkoff, Technology, Art, and Why the Future of Branding is Non-Fiction
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‘Of Course’ →
Om Malik on the “of course principle of design:”
Most companies (including web startups), he said, are looking to “wow” with their products, when in reality what they should be looking for is an “‘of course’ reaction from their users.”
Puzzled, I looked at him. And then it hit me: Great design means that one look and the end user reacts by knowing what to do with a knob or a...
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“Design must be functional and the functionality must be visually implemented...”
– Ferdinand Porsche, designer of the original Porsche 911, who died today at 76.
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“If there is a magic in story writing, and I am convinced there is, no one has...”
– John Steinbeck on writing
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“An alternative is to be happy wherever you are, with whatever you’ve got,...”
– I absolutely loved today’s blog post from Seth Godin. It was exactly what I needed to hear and a perfect way to start my morning.
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“[S]top acting like decorators. The more we cater to demands like, “I need a...”
– —Josh Brewer, Principle Designer at Twitter from this interview with The Web Standardistas. He continues:
Another thing, and maybe the most important, is to talk about and share our design process. Helping people understand what it is we do when and how we do it is key in changing that... 